Tag: Palestinians

The former New York Times Middle East bureau chief warns that the actions that led to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza will not bring peace to Israel but will instead create a new generation of Palestinian militants.

President Bush has arrived in Israel, where he plans to do some legacy shopping and see if he can’t just solve this Mideast conflict everyone is always talking about. Everyday Israelis and Palestinians, however, remain skeptical that their leaders will find a solution before the end of 2008, as promised.

For the first time during his presidency, in the final year of his final term, George W. Bush is headed to Israel and the West Bank. Given that he’s even less popular in the Mideast than he is at home, massive security preparations are under way.

Now that the Annapolis peace summit is over, the Mosaic Intelligence Report investigates the fallout from lowering the diplomatic bar, putting the slapstick back in world affairs and the conspicuous absence of Iraq, Iran and Hamas.

The Mosaic Intelligence Report’s Jamal Dajani heads to Jerusalem to find out why the Bush administration’s highly vaunted Annapolis peace summit has generated little more than skepticism in the Middle East.

If you are a young Muslim American and head off to the Middle East for a spell in a fundamentalist “madrassa,” or religious school, Homeland Security will probably greet you at the airport when you return. But if you are an American Jew and you join hundreds of teenagers from Europe and Mexico for an eight-week training course run by the Israel Defense Forces, you can post your picture wearing an Israeli army uniform and holding an automatic weapon on MySpace.

The Israeli government has dismissed a petition calling for a cease-fire with Hamas. The document, which was written by some of Israel’s leading writers and intellectuals, notes that “Israel has in the past negotiated with its worst enemies.”

I sat down with former President Jimmy Carter last week at the Carter Center in Atlanta. The Center was hosting a conference of human rights defenders, people at the front lines confronting repressive regimes around the globe. After a quarter-century of humanitarian work through the Carter Center, monitoring elections, working to eradicate neglected tropical diseases and focusing on the poor, Jimmy Carter now finds himself at the center of the storm in the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Israel and the U.S. are making a ghetto out of Gaza, hoping that cutting the territory off from the rest of the world will weaken democratically elected Hamas. They are wrong, and the innocent people of the Gaza Strip are paying the price.

Alan Johnston, a correspondent in Gaza for the BBC, has been released to Hamas by his captors after they held him for roughly four months. Hamas said Johnston’s release was a sign that it was restoring order to Gaza, which it recently seized from rival faction Fatah. Johnston says he stayed on top of the news of his captivity by listening to the BBC World Service on the radio.

A new poll shows that 70 percent of Israelis favor peace with the Palestinians along the lines of a two-state solution, but only 39 percent think peace will be achieved in the near future. Meanwhile, a majority of Israelis favor strengthening ties with Mahmoud Abbas’ (above left) Fatah regime in the West Bank.

The former New York Times Mideast bureau chief warns that America’s foreign policy, particularly under the Bush administration, has been subverted by an aggressive and dangerous Israeli agenda that could launch a nightmarish regional war.

According to the Irish prime minister, Tony Blair has agreed to serve the quartet—the U.S., the U.N., the EU and Russia—as a special envoy to the Mideast. Earlier reports suggested that Blair bristled at the limited scope of the position, but an aide says the outgoing British prime minister was eager to take the job and continue to work on the world stage.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has sworn in a new government that excludes Hamas, a move praised by both the U.S. and Israel. But the emergency government is likely to preside only over the West Bank because Hamas—which Israeli officials described as a “terrorist entity”—retains control of Gaza.

Israel has come under rocket fire from Lebanon, but says it will show restraint. Hezbollah has denied responsibility for the attack, the first since the Israel-Lebanon war last year. Israel and Lebanon have blamed the Palestinians, but no group has claimed responsibility yet.

Israel captured and occupied the Gaza Strip and the West Bank 40 years ago this week. The victory was celebrated as a great triumph, at once tripling the size of the land under Israeli control, including East Jerusalem. It was, however, a Pyrrhic victory. As the occupation stretched over the decades, it transformed and deformed Israeli society.

Al Jazeera takes its cameras inside the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp near Tripoli, where thousands of panicked residents have fled the fighting between a Palestinian militant group and the Lebanese army.

BBC reporter Alan Johnston will spend his 45th birthday in captivity. He was kidnapped nine weeks ago in Gaza, where he had worked for three years. The BBC will mark his birthday with candlelight vigils in cities around the world.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas has created its own version of Mickey Mouse, known as “Farfour,” to indoctrinate the next generation with such life lessons as “laying the foundation for a world led by Islamists.” TV show host Farfour has outraged Israel and rival faction Fatah, but the Walt Disney Co. has yet to comment.

A number of Arab foreign ministers have appointed Egypt and Jordan to meet with Israel over a peace proposal that would normalize relations between the Jewish state and the Arab world in exchange for a long list of concessions, some very unlikely to be met.

Responding to a Saudi peace proposal, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has invited all Arab heads of state to meet in Jerusalem for talks. Israel had rejected similar proposals, but Olmert now takes a different view, saying a multilateral meeting would be “worth the effort.”

J.J. Goldberg, editor in chief of the venerable progressive Jewish daily the Forward, joins the podcast this week to talk about the complexity of Zionism, the misguided intentions of neoconservatism and why AIPAC isn’t quite as sinister as you might think. Above, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert with President Bush.

J.J. Goldberg, editor-in-chief of the venerable progressive Jewish daily the Forward, joins the podcast this week to talk about the complexity of Zionism, the misguided intentions of neoconservatism and why AIPAC isn’t quite as sinister as you might think.

Violence has erupted in Gaza after a three-day cease-fire between rivals Hamas and Fatah came to an explosive end. At least 10 people have been killed and 120 wounded since the latest round of fighting began on Thursday.

Chris Hedges, the former Middle East bureau chief for The New York Times, argues that there can be no hope for peace in the Middle East as long as America continues to aid Israel in its dehumanizing practices.

The columnist weighs in on the controversial report about America’s pro-Israel lobby: The accusation of anti-Semitism is far too often raised in this country against anyone who criticizes the government of Israel.

As Palestinians swore in their Hamas-dominated parliament, Israel froze contact with the “terrorist” group, and stopped a planned transfer of funds.
Hamas dismissed the effect of the sanctions, and former President Jimmy Carter warns in an Op-Ed that America risks severe consequences if it conspires with Israel to disrupt the transfer of power to Hamas.

Russia’s leader answers mostly tough questions for three and a half hours without the aid of notes or alcohol—a new personal record. | storyOf interest: He doesn’t regard Hamas as a terrorist organization and won’t support cutting off its funding.